Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu – 18

by psgels, posted in Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu




This may very well have been the first episode of a ZEXCS series whose visuals genuinely impressed me. I know that the first episode had a big budget and that this episode had a lot of off models and all, but that’s not the point. ZEXCS-series always have this look of genericness, with perhaps the only exception to this point being Umi Monogatari. This episode completely blew my mind, though. The animation completely threw this genericness aside and went all out, and it looked awesome. I know that they just probably got one particularly awesome animation director on this episode, but I’d really love more episodes like this.

And seriously, this pretty much was the best Denyuuden episode since episode three. Perhaps even better. It’s episodes like this that I’ve been waiting for, and I’m really glad that this series is finally picking up, and at least the creators realize it. Now if only the producers who are responsible for the number of episodes would realize this too!

I admit: this Tiia-guy is good. The previous episode introduced him a bit generically, but this episode used that introduction really well when it suddenly turns out that he was genuinely trying to make Ryner into one of his comrades. I really love the bits of character-development here between Ryner and Ferris, and how they’ve actually been separated here.

I think the scene that impressed me the most here was the part in which we saw Shion’s army fire all of those arrows at Tiia. Animating huge armies is an incredibly difficult thing to do, and this show obviously didn’t have the budget to properly animate such an army: most of the time they were just still frames. And yet the way they were drawn, and their arrows flew, it really managed to bring life to them, and make them feel like a real army, rather than just the same guy copied and pasted over and over again like some bizarre house of mirrors.
Rating: *** (Awesome)

Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru – 05

by psgels, posted in Autumn 2010 Kaleidoscope



This week I’d like to talk about this surprisingly charming slice of life series. And I guess gather my thoughts about Shinbo at the moment. I mean, I consider him to be an excellent director. The thing I hate however is how he is working on way too many projects. Just get him to work on one single project every year or two years: that will make them extra special, especially with the wait time in between. Why can’t he just leave Shaft’s other projects to the other directors at Shaft? Why does he need to hold their hands for every single series?

My big annoyance with Shinbo is that I’ve just seen too much of his series and I really do not want to sit through another one of his uninspired series. At this point, those series are easy to spot because he ends up doing one of two things:
1. Repeat himself. The best example of this is Natsu no Arashi 2, in which the first four episodes talked about the exact. same. freaking. subject. But also Sayonara Zetsubou-Sensei. My guess is that that’s also why I can’t enjoy Arakawa Under the Bridge: there are just way too many similarities between the two.
2. Take his style way over the top to the point where it loses all its charms and ends up only getting in the way of telling the story. Examples of this (in my experience at least) were ef – a tale of melodies and Bakemonogatari.

Soredemo Machi is neither: it neither tries too hard, and while maids have been milked to death in anime, the delivery is fresh here. It doesn’t try to force down as many random jokes as possible, but instead focuses on just portraying the characters without trying to pretend to be anything more, and on top of that the different stories are varied and not repetitive. Finally.

Arashiyama is quite likable. In this episode she was mostly just a side-character, but even there she was pretty enjoyable as she tried to encourage Toshiko and her brother’s romances. It neither dragged on, and yet you could see that she loved to tease them. These kinds of romances are now also cliched as hell (‘I want to propose to you but I’m too scared so I just say something that sounds like “love”), but the creative characterization still made them enjoyable. If the characterization of Togainu no Chi was as good as this episode, I really would not have minded it being a dating sim.

On top of that, I’m glad that we finally have a Shaft series with a proper budget here. Especially the first two episodes had very good inbetween animation, but this episode too was very dynamically animated. I also like how all of the characters have their distinct character-designs, rather than just feeling like stock puppets with different eyes and hair pasted on top of them. On top of that, it’s also an interesting technique to use CG in frames that aren’t moving: it certainly took me a while before I noticed it.

It’s not perfect, especially in the way that those title cards get more annoying every episode, and there are times when it tries too hard (like with the chair in the previous episode), but I like its charms and how down to earth it is. It’s also got some good jokes as well (like the Czar and Luther).
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Shiki – 14

by psgels, posted in Shiki



Holy crap! This episode was unbelievable. It was quite possibly the best episode that Shiki has shown us so far, but dear God was it morbid and depressing.

For the most part, this episode continued the trend that the previous episodes had set up: the vampires are having their way, and get more and more powerful as they go along. We learn what happened to Masao: in the end he was just too chicken to kill a human, but strangely enough he was kept alive. We also learn another reason why the vampires chose a small village as their base: its cemetery, in order to ensure that as little people as possible get cremated. Oh, and unfortunately it seems like finally the Awesome Beard Guy’s family is going to be on the list of next victims, along with one of the nurses of the infirmary: Yuki.

But Toshio… the things he does in this episode… at first I thought that his eyes meant that just like Natsuno, he gave up, and collapsed under the stress. But to keep the corpse of his wife hidden, only to brutally experiment on her and kill her afterwards in order to find out the secret of the Shiki, it was just creepy beyond belief. Especially in the way that she actually kept screaming and pleading. Heck, we know that she may have been in a state of confusion when she woke up, but to wake up, only to find your husband trying to destroy your brains…. It’s just completely disturbing, but I loved how well this episode built everything up.
Rating: *** (Awesome)

Kuragehime – 03

by psgels, posted in Kuragehime




Whoa, the characters here are all in their thirties. The females anyway. That makes this show even more interesting; I mean, when was the last time we had a series where the average age of the characters was this high? Ristorante Paradiso? It’s impressive, even for Noitamina’s standards. It’s great that they still dare to make series like this.

I like Kuranosuke’s relationship with his mother: his parents have been divorced for god knows how long for now, and his mother definitely had a lot of influence on him (probably partly inspired his cross-dressing), and yet the series doesn’t try to create cheap drama around her, yet keeps things down to earth.

And yet the series is also so over the top, in the way that Kuranosuke keeps penetrating the ridiculous and in-denial lifestyle of the sisterhood, while at the same time we have Tsukimi making her own impact with Kuranosuke’s brother. The whole way in which he just forces himself onto Tsukimi is what I like best about this series: it’s just so dynamic and lively.

The characterization for the entire cast is excellent, though. On paper especially the members of the sisterhood would have been awfully annoying, but the way that this show portrays them, by giving them some depth here really works. They’re all completely in denial, and have shut themselves off from the outside world completely. They just pretend that there’s nothing wrong with their lifestyles.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Nurarihyon no Mago – 18

by psgels, posted in Nurarihyon no Mago



A really charming episode. At this point, Rikuo’s classmates have really completely stopped being annoying, and they’re as interesting to watch as the rest oft he cast right now. Natsumi getting attacked was a very neat way to show her own experiences to kami and youkai. The drama around her could have been cheesy if she was the same nondescript character of the first few episodes, but here, it really worked.

On top of that, this episode also made use of the “forgotten gods”, like series as Natsume Yuujinchou did as well. It’s a great little theme, that works especially well in this context, because it’s a lot of those nearly forgotten gods, that maybe have one or two people praying to them, who lend the Nura-clan their power.

I wonder why that Sodemogi (on a side-note: I hate having to rely on MyAnimeList to check on the names of these characters: they’re riddled with spoilers. The page of this guy for example just tells how he dies without any sort of marking, making me glad that I didn’t see it last week…) went without an escort this time, though. Would that make him harder to spot or something?
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Shinryaku! Ika-Musume – 05

by psgels, posted in Shinryaku! Ika Musume



Three very different stories this episode. The first was the least interesting, but that was mostly because it was yet another one of those stereotypical portrayals of Americans. It packed some great jokes, though, especially in the way that she managed to convince Squid Girl that she’s an alien, only for a bunch of shrimps to immediately break that spell.

The second part was hilarious, though, in the way that Squid Girl actually tried to take over the local high school. I love how subtly everything escalated: things all started very harmlessly, with Squid Girl finding out about the new terms starting. It’s hilarious that when left alone, Squid Girl just kept searching more an more trouble, in which she eventually ended up kidnapping the headmaster and forcing him to eat shrimps he’s allergic to. I also loved how Eiko at first thought that letting Squid Girl roam around the school would be harmless enough.

The third part was… pretty unique and charming, and really well animated. There is no dialogue, and instead of the regular set-up we see some dream-like sequence about Eiko picking up a really cute miniature Squid Girl. It’s great to see how much the creators were able to say here, without actually saying anything and made excellent use of the fact that it’s animation.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Shinrei Tantei Yakumo – 05

by psgels, posted in Shinrei Tantei Yakumo



It’s rushed, it’s full of coincidences, I know that. But damn, this episode was surprisingly good here. I really want to praise the creators here, that even though they had to cut god knows how much from the manga in order to make this fit into just one episode, they still managed to make it work. This show is indeed visibly flawed, but it also avoids the single biggest pitfall for any rushed anime: the fact that the plot doesn’t come together.

This episode just kept building up its tension, right from the start, and within these 20 minutes, they really did lot here: they gave the doctor a good backstory, it fleshed the rest of the cast, especially Gotou tried to squeeze a bit of personality as much as he could without getting in the way of the story or the rest of the characters, we know a bit more about the new intern (who despite his whining is surprisingly useful), and most importantly: we now know who Yakumo’s father is. That certainly added a neat twist to this series.

The atmosphere was particularly wonderful in this episode. That’s where it really helps to be a Bee-Train series, because that soundtrack definitely kept me to the edge of my seat, and it worked great with the storytelling and the pacing of the series. This balance is probably the thing that makes this show works so well: the characters and story are very well balanced in each episode, and the creators make sure to give all of them equal time to show themselves off. Its definitely not the most solid series, but to me it does feel like everything comes together like it should.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

OVA Impressions: Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn – 02

by psgels, posted in Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn, OVA Impressions



Now that we’re two hours in, it’s gotten time to start asking in what way Gundam Unicorn sets itself apart from the other Gundam series. Unfortunately, I’m hard-pressed to find that answer…

I guess that the closest that this episode came to standing on its own was the point at which it showed that random Zeon family. It of course already was established that the Zeon aren’t completely evil by the very first Gundam series thirty years ago, but this episode did give a bit more depth to that by showing the people that the Zeon are trying to protect.

But apart from that though… the main problem with Unicorn really is its completely generic story, setting and characters: it’s all just “been there, done that”. There’s yet another boy who through some loophole in the rules gets his hand on the most powerful mobile suit known to man, there is yet another romance with a girl from the enemy (and hey! she’s even a princess this time), there again are strings of mecha battles. It’s all just too safe.

This all could have been forgiven with the right characterization, but… the lead character. I mean, most Gundam leads do fairly well to stand as solid characters, but this guy is completely generic. It’s not really the fact that he’s able to pilot a really powerful mecha: there are tons of other anime who do that. Instead, he just feels so out of place. Here we have a serious story about the war between two big fractions, and right there in the middle there’s this brat who keeps whining because he just discovered that people die in a war. Because of him we had to listen to strings of cheesy morals, instead of focusing on the story.

The same happened to Char here: in Zeta Gundam he was pretty interesting, in the first Gundam he was an excellent villain, but here, he looks like he lost all his charms, relying just on his cool-factor. The action also was something I got bored with. It’s the exact same type of action that we’ve been seeing over and over again. It was indeed solid, but the only thing that set it apart from all of the other Gundams was its airbags and the way in which the lead character vomited in his suit. okay, that’s admirable, but that’s not something you want to advertise yourself with.

Gundam Unicorn is solid, I’m not going to deny that. I did like the parts that didn’t feature the male lead. Minerva thank god shows how to not be annoying as a teenager, and also all of the adults knew exactly in what kind of situation they’re in, and they stand behind their choices. There was this interesting bit of intrigue going on, and at least most of the adults here felt very natural.

But that’s the thing: it’s got such a solid base here, and it doesn’t use it. This is Gundam: it’s got a huge graphics budget here; its direction is very solid and thought out; it’s got all of the ingredients for at least a solid story, grounded in realism. It just feels like it put its ambition in the wrong places.

Of course, it wasn’t bad either. I really hope that this episode was simply building up, so that we can at least get to see something interesting in the final episodes. I first want to see that before I’ll buy that, though. My biggest hope right now resides on that box. If that gets to be more than just another McGuyver, then this could still get interesting.
OVA Episode Rating: 7,75/10

Star Driver – 05

by psgels, posted in Star Driver




After watching all of the shows that debuted this autumn season, I’m really sure now: Star Driver has by far the best direction and animation, and it’s one of the few series that didn’t blow its biggest budget in its first episode, and actually kept a consistent quality throughout all its episodes. And the great thing is that the animation here really helps in bringing the cast alive: some of the inbetween animation in this episode was really smooth and detailed. At that level, it really adds something extra to the characters.

Also, this episode was weird. There was this school nurse who used her cybuddy to make herself as young as a teenaged girl again, but the weirdest thing was that she was a huge raving fangirl for bishies. It was quite ridiculous, but the creators actually managed to make it work. It again managed to make this nurse into a great character to follow, even though she would have been obnoxious in most other series with a sub-par direction.

Also, regarding the battle: this episode convinced me: they’re going to be great. So far, none of the battles really looked like the others. Takuto managed to win in every one of them, but again: him winning every battle he’s in is trivial in a series in which there’s so much else going on. I liked how the creators actually went with the twist in which she is defeated by her own fetish and carelessness.

On top of that, you can also see that the creators aren’t forgetting the rest of the cast here: while the first few episodes focused on these relatively minor characters, they were also busy fleshing out the main cast, and this episode was no exception. That’s the sign of a good episodic series. I’ve said this before, but I really don’t mind an episodic series when it’s done right. If they can use these stories to build up the series as a whole, it’s only going to make the series better.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Heartcatch Precure – 38

by psgels, posted in Heartcatch Precure




This series really is unbelievable: it uses some cliches that have been beaten to death in the mahou shoujo genre by now, and yet it manages to avoid all of the pitfalls. Now that the power-up arc is finally over, I really have to say that I’m delighted with how it turned out: it was built up really well, the characters knew the disadvantages, and yet they also knew that in order to beat Dune, it really was a power they needed. In the past two episodes, Dune finally arrived close enough to earth to start sending his own monsters, and they’re a complete league apart from what they’ve faced so far.

And then there are the transformation scenes: this series just has so many different ones, and they’re all completely gorgeous in their own ways. This episode again was a visual orgasm: it may not have had the incredibly smooth framerate of Cure Sunshine’s transformation, but it was incredibly varied, especially for a transformation scene (usually they just have one theme and stick with it with really not a lot of creativity). There was so much going on in that scene, and it looked really gorgeous. If I had to give a criticism, it’s that CG hand of Blossom: it’s here where the CG stood out a bit.

As for Cure Blossom, the creators did a wonderful job on her, accepting her shy side. I really love the choice of having her take much longer than the others, because it made her character stand out even more, even though she had to do the same as everyone else. It’s the difference in which they all managed to accept their flaws that really made this a wonderful arc.

I’m so curious to that final quarter of this series now. I mean, when was the last time that we had a random story in this series? The past number of episodes have all had their purpose, so I really doubt that this show is going to close off by going back to the desatorians. What I really want to see here is 13 episodes of quality time, dedicated to fleshing out and developing Dune and the people from Sabaku. That really would be awesome.
Rating: *** (Awesome)